Ladies European Tour lands in S. Korea for 1st time with team event

South Korea will host its first Ladies European Tour (LET) golf event this week, with a Saudi Arabia-backed team competition featuring professional stars and amateurs.

The latest leg of the Aramco Team Series will be held at New Korea Country Club in Goyang, on the northwestern outskirts of Seoul, from Friday to Sunday. The series is presented by the Public Investment Fund (PIF), Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund.

This US$1 million competition will feature 36 teams, each made up of three touring pros and one amateur.

Team captains, seeded based on their world ranking positions, will select the first additional player to join their team. Each side will then be randomly assigned an amateur player and another professional player from the remaining pool.

The Aramco event uses a “two-from-four” scoring system for the team competition over the first two days, meaning the two best scores on each hole count for teams. For instance, if two players on a team each score a birdie and the remaining two players pick up pars on a given hole, the score for that team is two-under. This setup allows amateurs to contribute to the results of their teams.

The professional players’ scores on every hole over three days will be used for their individual competition.

From the host country, world No. 12 Kim Hyo-joo will be the top-ranked player in the field.

“I am looking forward to playing in a tournament with such a unique format,” Kim said. “This will be my first time playing in an event like this. I will try my best to put on a good show in front of fans here in Korea.”

Kim, the 2014 Evian Championship winner, will be joined by the 2017 KPMG Women’s PGA Championship winner Danielle Kang and world No. 8 Charley Hull, the 2014 LET Player of the Year.

Hull, hailing from England, said taking LET action to South Korea represents a great opportunity for women’s golf in general.

“Korea has produced some incredible women’s golfers who are consistently performing at the top,” Hull said. “Having the LET and Aramco Team Series make that move to bring us to Korea will be a fantastic chance for us to show all the avid golf fans what makes this series so unique and showcase the talent who play across it.”

Hull finished second to Alexandra Forsterling of Germany in the season’s first Aramco Team Series event in Tampa, Florida, in March, and said she is “determined to go one better in Korea.”

“My game has been in great shape this season, which has helped my confidence both on and off the course,” Hull added. “It would be great to claim the first ever LET win in the country, and give myself momentum ahead of a big year.”

New Korea Country Club, an exclusive, members-only course, will host its first professional tournament in 38 years.